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What indigenous leaders from Brazil thought of Jair Bolsonaro’s U.N. address
Farmers are reportedly setting fire to the Amazon rainforest to show support for Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro’s policy of opening up protected areas to private ownership. According to a widely disseminated article in a small newspaper, Folha do Progresso, the organizers of this “Day of Fire” are hoping that 2019 sets a record for burning.
Ranchers and farmers routinely use fire in tropical agriculture to clear land for planting and cattle pastures, but the practice had slowed before Bolsonaro took office in January. Brazil’s space research agency reported this week that fires have increased 84 percent this year compared to the dry season last year. On Monday, smoke from rampant fires plunged Sao Paulo into darkness in the afternoon.
Many news outlets have said the 74,000 fires Brazil has seen this year sets a record, but that’s based on statistics that only date back to 2013. And deforestation is actually down from its peak in the 1980s. The real, undisputable news here is that there’s been a spike in fires and deforestation under Bolsonaro. And given the Amazon rainforest’s important role in capturing carbon emissions, the stakes seem much higher.
Christian Poirier, a program director for the nonprofit Amazon Watch, said that farmers were clearly emboldened by Bolsonaro to burn forests. “The fires currently ravaging the Amazon are directly related to President Bolsonaro’s anti-environmental rhetoric, in which he errantly frames forests and forest protections as impediments to Brazil’s economic growth. Farmers and ranchers understand the president’s message as a license to commit arson with wanton impunity, in order to aggressively expand their operations into the rainforest.”
Bolsonaro isn’t exactly taking credit, saying he had a “feeling” that the fires were set by nonprofit environmental groups trying to make his government look bad.
There’s been a huge growth in Brazil’s farms, especially after President Donald Trump’s trade war sent China — the top buyer of U.S. soybeans — shopping in South America. But the farm boom won’t improve the lives of poor Brazilians if it depends on dismantling environmental protections, said Toby Gardner, the director of nonprofit Trase. He sees Brazil trending toward “apparent disregard for devastating effects of environmental degradation seen from the recent and unprecedented spate of wildfires, set by landowners to clear forest for agriculture,” he said in an email.
Brazil’s massive forests are a critical part of the Earth’s life support system. The Amazon holds some 17 percent of the world’s plant-based carbon, and fires release that greenhouse gas. It’s home to millions of unique species and people. Fires are also burning in Brazil’s Cerrado — the central savanna — and its other forests.
“We think this Day of Fire really captures the craziness of what is going on in Brazil — deforestation for the sake of it, as an act of political demonstration,” said Alex Armstrong of the environmental group Mighty Earth in an email. Mighty Earth and other organizations think big corporations can prevent deforestation by promising not to buy crops from Brazilian farmers who burn forests. Some corporations, such as the grain-trading giant Cargill, say they need a supportive government in Brazil before they can act.
It’s worth noting that Grist could not independently confirm that farmers have set fires as a demonstration: Every story and source interviewed about the Day of Fire pointed to the same article based on an interview with an anonymous source. But the space agency observed a spate of fires in the region where farmers reportedly planned their protest. And a government prosecutor has opened an investigation into the reported Day of Fire.
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Are farmers setting the Amazon ablaze in support of Bolsonaro?
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The battle over the Amazon has been turned into a Brazilian telenovela
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Brazil was set to be the host country for COP25, next year’s crucial United Nation talks to address climate change, but just two months after offering to do so, the country’s officials have reversed their stance.
Brazilian leaders communicated the decision on Monday to Patrícia Espinosa, executive secretary of the UN Convention on Climate Change, just days before the start of COP24, this year’s annual climate conference being held in Katowice, Poland. The Brazilian government blames the change on budget constraints and the ongoing presidential transition process. But others are interpreting the move as yet another sign of President-elect Jair Bolsonaro’s impending war on the environment.
“This decision is not surprising considering it comes from a leader with proven skepticism towards the reality of climate change, and open animosity towards those working to preserve our climate,” Christian Poirier, program director at Amazon Watch, told Grist. Poirier also says he doesn’t buy Brazil’s budget excuse for reversing on hosting the conference. “It is clear that Mr. Bolsonaro’s reactionary political agenda was the decisive factor in this decision.”
Bolsonaro confirmed that he participated in the decision, saying “I recommended to our future minister that we avoid the realization of this event here in Brazil.”
(The United Nations did not immediately reply to Grist’s request for comment.)
Before Bolsonaro’s election, the country seemed eager to host the next round of international climate talks. According to Brazilian news site O Globo, the foreign ministry had said Brazil’s offer reflected “the consensus of Brazilian society on the importance and the urgency of actions that contribute to the fight against climate change.”
But in some ways, the current reversal comes as no surprise. During his campaign, Bolsonaro (a.k.a. The Trump of the Tropics) vowed to jettison from the Paris Climate Agreement — though he’s since backtracked from that promise. Still, he’s been steadfast in his desire to open up the Amazon, the world’s largest rainforest, to mining, farming and dam building. He’s said he wants to open up the country’s existing indigenous reserves to commercial exploitation. And earlier this month, he chose a new foreign minister that has said he believes climate change is a Marxist plot to help China.
A recent report issued by the Brazilian government found the Amazon has reached its highest levels of deforestation in a decade, thanks to illegal logging and the expansion of agriculture in the area. And there are major concerns that Bolsonaro’s lax environmental policies could push the Amazon past its tipping point as one of the world’s most important carbon sinks.
Brazil withdrawing its offer to host COP25 also carries symbolic weight when you consider the country is the birthplace of global climate talks. The milestone Rio Earth Summit of 1992 set the green agenda for decades to come.
“The image of Brazil is at risk,” said Carlos Rittl, executive secretary of the Brazilian Climate Observatory, a coalition of environmental non-governmental organizations, in an interview with the New York Times. “Climate and the environment are the only issues where Brazil is a leader in global terms. We are not leaders in world trade, we are not leaders in a geopolitical sense on security issues. But on climate and environment we are leaders, and we are giving that up.”
The South American country’s decision has left the United Nations scrambling to find a new site for the summit. A new venue for the summit has not yet been determined.
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Bad news for the Amazon as Brazil backs out of hosting UN climate talks
Brazil was set to be the host country for COP 25, next year’s crucial United Nation talks to address climate change, but just two months after offering to do so, the country’s officials have reversed their stance.
Brazilian leaders communicated the decision on Monday to Patrícia Espinosa, executive secretary of the U.N. Convention on Climate Change, just days before the start of COP 24, this year’s annual climate conference being held in Katowice, Poland. The Brazilian government blames the change on budget constraints and the ongoing presidential transition process. But others are interpreting the move as yet another sign of President-elect Jair Bolsonaro’s impending war on the environment.
“This decision is not surprising considering it comes from a leader with proven skepticism towards the reality of climate change, and open animosity towards those working to preserve our climate,” Christian Poirier, program director at Amazon Watch, told Grist. Poirier also says he doesn’t buy Brazil’s budget excuse for reversing on hosting the conference. “It is clear that Mr. Bolsonaro’s reactionary political agenda was the decisive factor in this decision.”
Bolsonaro confirmed that he participated in the decision, saying “I recommended to our future minister that we avoid the realization of this event here in Brazil.”
(The United Nations did not immediately reply to Grist’s request for comment.)
Before Bolsonaro’s election, the country seemed eager to host the next round of international climate talks. According to Brazilian news site O Globo, the foreign ministry had said Brazil’s offer reflected “the consensus of Brazilian society on the importance and the urgency of actions that contribute to the fight against climate change.”
But in some ways, the current reversal comes as no surprise. During his campaign, Bolsonaro (a.k.a. The Trump of the Tropics) vowed to jettison from the Paris Climate Agreement — though he’s since backtracked from that promise. Still, he’s been steadfast in his desire to open up the Amazon, the world’s largest rainforest, to mining, farming, and dam building. He’s said he wants to open up the country’s existing indigenous reserves to commercial exploitation. And earlier this month, he chose a new foreign minister that has said he believes climate change is a Marxist plot to help China.
A recent report issued by the Brazilian government found the Amazon has reached its highest levels of deforestation in a decade, thanks to illegal logging and the expansion of agriculture in the area. And there are major concerns that Bolsonaro’s lax environmental policies could push the Amazon past its tipping point as one of the world’s most important carbon sinks.
Brazil withdrawing its offer to host COP 25 also carries symbolic weight when you consider the country is the birthplace of global climate talks. The milestone Rio Earth Summit of 1992 set the green agenda for decades to come.
“The image of Brazil is at risk,” said Carlos Rittl, executive secretary of the Brazilian Climate Observatory, a coalition of environmental non-governmental organizations, in an interview with the New York Times. “Climate and the environment are the only issues where Brazil is a leader in global terms. We are not leaders in world trade, we are not leaders in a geopolitical sense on security issues. But on climate and environment we are leaders, and we are giving that up.”
The South American country’s decision has left the United Nations scrambling to find a new site for the summit. A new venue for the summit has not yet been determined.
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Bad news for the Amazon as Brazil backs out of hosting U.N. climate talks
Even before Jair Bolsonaro won Brazil’s Presidential race last week, many environmentalists were on high alert. The far-right politician’s positions on agriculture and economic development (he’s gone back and forth on whether he’ll keep environment ministries and agriculture ministries separate) could open up Brazil’s precious rainforests to deforestation and economic exploitation.
But it’s not just the Amazon that’s threatened — the lives of many of Brazil’s indigenous peoples are under siege as well. A little over a week ago, the President-elect signaled he might backtrack on his campaign promise to leave the Paris climate accord, but only if he gets assurances that Brazil would not have to cede sovereignty to native tribes.
“Indigenous peoples suffer disproportionately from violence,” Christian Poirier, program director at Amazon Watch, told Grist. “Under Bolsonaro, we can expect to see a growth in this very alarming trend.”
In the first few days after Bolsonaro’s election, there were reports of a wave of violence against indigenous communities, with pro-Bolsonaro militias allegedly destroying villages and gravely harming individuals.
“It sends signals that the murder and intimidation carried out by actors and gunmen against land defenders will not only be tolerated, but it will be a climate of impunity,” Poirier said.
Here’s what four Brazilian indigenous leaders had to say to Amazon Watch about how Bolsonaro’s election is impacting their communities. These quotes have been edited for length and clarity.
Dinamã Tuxá, Coordinator of Brazil’s Association of Indigenous Peoples (APIB) said:
This scenario is totally heartbreaking. Bolsonaro has made clear and consistent declarations about ending the titling of indigenous lands, which are completely opposed to our rights. His racist, homophobic, misogynist, fascist discourse shows how Brazilian politics will be in the coming years.
Our fear is that this situation will worsen. He foments hatred and violence against indigenous peoples with a discourse claiming that we are an obstacle for development, ignoring our contributions to environmental balance. We know our titled territories help to climate stability and that our preservation of these ecosystems offers collective benefits.
His discourse gives those who live around indigenous lands the right to practice violence without any sort of accountability. Those who invade indigenous lands and kill our people will be esteemed. He represents an institutionalization of genocide in Brazil.
We will resist his hate by protesting in the streets and by filing lawsuits, despite the fact that the courts have unfortunately not fulfilled their duty to uphold our constitutional rights. We will fight as we have for the last 518 years, waging resistance to guarantee our existence.
Alessandra Korap Munduruku, Coordinator of the Munduruku people’s Pariri Association:
We are very worried. We Munduruku people need our land to be titled. When the President says he will not title one centimeter of indigenous land, it hurts those of us who have long fought to defend our territories from the invasion of loggers and miners. When he talks of ending the ability of [environmental enforcement agency] IBAMA to issue [environmental] fines and prohibits federal police from accompanying their inspection actions we suffer and are scared to even leave our homes.
When the president says he will end human rights, what will happen to us? We cannot be held hostage by fear. We indigenous peoples in the movement need to think of everyone because our struggle is for everyone. We cannot retreat from this challenge but only advance. We must walk together to defend the Amazon, and Mother Earth who is calling for help.
Sônia Guajajara, former Coordinator of Brazil’s Association of Indigenous Peoples (APIB) and vice-presidential candidate for the PSOL party:
The destructive agenda announced by Jair Bolsonaro is highly aggressive to all those who struggle for justice, especially for the most vulnerable population. We indigenous people have resisted for 518 years to overcome the colonial structure and we will continue to be resolute in our struggle for our right to exist as original peoples. Our work to demarcate our territories will continue to be urgent and we will not desist. This is our struggle!
Luiz Eloy Terena, lawyer for Brazil’s Association of Indigenous Peoples (APIB), said:
In following this election one thing we’ve noted, from the declarations of many indigenous leaders, is that our struggle continues. Indigenous peoples and traditional communities have lived in this resistance for a long [time]. For many years, I’ve monitored the encampments of the Guaraní-Kaiowá and Terena peoples who face violence [on a daily basis] from farmers and their armed agents, who disrespect their rights and can attack at any moment.
For us indigenous peoples this election represents a continuity of our struggle and encourages us to do what we have always done in defense of democracy and our rights. Today, these rights appear more threatened in every space, from our villages to our cities to our institutions.
We understand that this was an electoral process where people voted [Bolsonaro] into power. But he is not simply a presidential candidate. He sharply represents the profile of the majority of Brazilians who see in him their own representation. His discourse of racism, sexism, and violence is very prevalent in the people and especially relates to indigenous peoples, who they do not accept.
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Here’s what 4 Indigenous Leaders had to say about Brazil’s President-elect
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